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In this podcast episode, we talk about a material impact on my elderly father as a result of the stay-at-home because of COVID-19 (coronavirus).

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TRANSCRIPT:

Hello!  Welcome to the Sally in the Zen podcast. I’m your host, Sally. I’m a Zen Buddhist caregiver to my elderly folks, always in pursuits to find Zen moments in everyday living. If you’re new to the podcast, welcome! If you’re not new, and you’re returning, welcome back for another adventure.

Hope everyone is staying safe and doing whatever they can to stay sane, especially going into the holidays. Time just flies after Halloween, and here we are, in December. And before you know it, year 2021 will become a reality. Can’t believe we’re already talking about 2021. But you know what? 2020 will be in our rear view mirror and hopefully 2021 will bring in better days, better change, just over everything better for the world and for us. Here’s to hoping.  

And by the way, a little trivia. So 2021 is going to be the Year of the Ox, which is supposed to be a lucky year. And all signs are pointing to it being a better year to 2020. But anyways.

For today’s episode, I thought I’ll do it a little bit differently. Because it’s December and I’m feeling a little nostalgic and I’m feeling a little storytelling about my little family. So if you’re interested, I invite you to grab a cup of coffee, a cup of tea and sit back and just enjoy.

I don’t often talk about how it feels to be Mom and Dad’s caregiver, a daughter taking care of her elderly folks, people who are aging right before her eyes. And I don’t really pull myself out of the weeds of the actual things that I do for them on a day-to-day basis. I don’t pull myself to the 10,000 ft view often and today’s story is actually that view.

So I’m blessed that I am their daughter. I’m blessed they’re also my best friends, where it’s an honor to help them to care for them during the winter of their lives. And to be with them. It’s not a chore because I chose to do this, and I wouldn’t have it any other way.

What I’m going through with them, what I’m learning from taking care of my parents are things that I know I will be going through personally when I’m in their shoes, at their age. And these are all lessons learned as far as I’m concerned of what I can do to proactively now…prevent, take better care of myself, drink more water, plan out the horizon a little bit better. Just be proactive each and every single day. 

And it’s usually around the end of the year around this time where I tried to put a little perspective on the activities that happened throughout the year and tried to plot forward some sort of plan into the new year. Rather than just do what I’ve always been doing which is haphazardly living and breathing and drinking and sleeping and just going on day to day. I actually want to be more mindful of how I spend that time now. 

So let me begin by saying Dad is my Zen Master. He is 78 years old. He’s a stroke survivor and a diabetic. And Mom is 71, and she’s a diabetic and has a severe case of gout sometimes. Because she just loves to eat and she has no control over those things. And I don’t blame her because food is just so tasty. But you know, there’s worst things to worry about than that.

But on that premise, before COVID actually impacted us, Mom and Dad were pretty active. They were pretty independent senior citizens. They were physically able to walk every single day, three miles. They were able to take care of the chores. They’re of course able to take care of themselves in the bathroom, bathing, shaving, cleaning themselves. Those are what you called the “daily living activities” that people do on their own up until the day they don’t. You know, for one reason or another.

Being their caregiver and seeing how healthy they’ve been all this time, I didn’t once think about the day of when I would be faced with their frailty. I wasn’t really prepared for that day which actually came recently.

Pre-COVID, like I just said, Mom and Dad were physically active and they could walk three miles a day and that’s what they did on good days. Not rainy days or cold days but on normal good days, they’ll be out and about. And because we’ve been homebound since March and we’ve gotten used to staying indoors all this time, so it wasn’t until like August, maybe? I don’t remember anymore… where I convinced them to start going back out there to get a breath of fresh air, to have the sun on their face, to build back up their physical fitness, for all intents and purposes. And we’ve been doing that in baby steps.

We’ve been walking for a while now but it was just recently where one day Dad and I were walking, and I noticed that his head was down. His eyes were, like, looking at his feet and he was just slowly walking. I’d say slower than normal but just something was off with him. And I’m asking him if he was okay, and he’s like yes, I’m okay.  I’m like, how are you? How’s your head? Because sometimes he has dizzy spells, and he says no, I’m okay. My head is okay. It’s just a little heavy. What do you mean by heavy? It’s just a little heavy for me to hold up right now, and I’m like, are you dizzy? And he’s like, no, no but my feet is light.

So his head is heavy, which is the reason why he’s looking down. His head is kind of hanging a little bit in front of him and his feet is light. To me that sounds like his balance is not where it should be. So I’m holding on to his hand, just making sure that he doesn’t fall because he fell a couple times before in the past, and had terrified me. And I found that I had to actually not just hold his hand in my hand, I had to hold tight his whole entire arm against me. So we were basically hip to hip, arm to arm, hand to hand during this walk. 

And it was just a little walk going up a tiny bump of a hill and when we hit the top and started going down the slight decline of that hill, he was picking up speed. He had no breaking capability and I was essentially his brakes because I held on to him tight. But it looks like and it felt like he was going to pitch forward and fall head over heel because the weight of his head…I could actually feel it. Since I’m leaning against him, I can feel where his body weight was and for whatever reason, it was topside.

So I suggested that we turn back and he was fine. I ended up half carrying him home because he couldn’t walk with balance. So he was shuffling slowly with me but I’m holding on to his hand, holding on to his arm, and I had to shift so that I threw my other arm around his shoulders and just half carried him as he leaned against me home. 

And we got home safe, we got home sound. I put him in the living room, gave him water, covered his legs with a blanket, stuck him in front of the TV and stuck the remote in his hand and he was happy as a clam. Everything was good. He didn’t have a fever. He didn’t have a dizzy spell. He was just tired, and after a few minutes he went to take a cat nap but he was fine.

Because he was fine I waited until his next doctor’s check up to ask the doctor about that and when she did a physical on him, he was fine. As for me, I was devastated. Because I guess the fear of the day where things continue to change with him, like the first one was the stroke. Now this is the second where his physicality is actually declined.

Nowadays I’m physically helping him walk. His hand is always in mine and he’s leaning against me sometimes, but for more times than not, he’s able to walk with his own steam. But his hand is always in mine because I don’t want a repeat of what happened. And he’s gotten used to my holding his hand, and likewise. I like his hand in mind too, especially when we’re walking outside. 

And a funny side effect of holding his hand outside when we go walking, and then shopping and wherever, is that people assume that he’s my husband. Now that’s a brain teaser that I don’t want to bring tease about. So there you go.

Now I have read somewhere that a person’s frailty, the picture of a person’s frailty. What would that look like? How would that sound? What would that feel like? And I learned firsthand what that was with my own father. And it made me appreciate what I have. That he’s still here, he’s still relatively healthy, that I’m able to help him get comfortable, keep him warm and just make him happy. Try to make him happy, at least.

Now I talk a lot about my father, my Zen Master and I very rarely talk about Zen Mum.   Zen Mum is opposite of Zen Master. She’s really quite independent, healthy as a horse. But if she didn’t have to go out walking and if she was able to sit on the couch literally all day and watch Netflix, that’s her ideal day. But I’m the one that pester her to get on the treadmill for at least 15 minutes because she’s 190 lbs and she’s only 4’11 in height. So you could visually see that she’s a little bit obese, right? 

And here’s a little TMI. Because we’re keeping it real and we’re all family here, and this is a reality of caregivers. The only thing I have to worry about with Zen Mum is every time we go for a walk, I need to make sure that she does a Number Two before we even walk out the door. ‘

And if you don’t know what a Number Two is, you can certainly Google it. But I don’t need to fuss over her as much as I fuss over Pop. And I’m thankful for that too because if I had to fuss over them together at the same time, I would actually just start drinking. Forget being a Zen Buddhist where you just don’t drink alcohol. I was so be in the bottle.  

But like I said earlier, I wouldn’t change a thing because it’s gotten us closer. I’m so appreciative of what I have. I’m blessed, truly blessed, and I’m truly blessed to be a caregiver.   

So to all of the caregivers out there, whether you do this formally, informally for family member or for someone because it’s your occupation, my hats off to you all. My hats off to the courage that you show, the endurance that you have, and the care that you give to people. My hats off to you.

Well that takes us to the end of today’s storytelling episode. I hope you enjoyed it. We’ve got one more episode before the end of the year and I’ve been pondering on an idea that I’m seriously thinking about pursuing in the beginning of the new year. And it’s about my job. Or the lack of having a job, right? And I know I’m not alone in that. Tons of people unfortunately are laid off in today’s world, the economy, the unemployment, the COVID-19 impact. And I know I’m not alone when I feel, sometimes, the depression of being jobless, of feeling useless, of applying to so many jobs that… not a peep, not a sound. And makes you begin to doubt yourself and erodes your confidence. What the hell is that about, you know? 

So you guys are actually the first to hear about this brainstorm that I’m currently having. Whether or not it comes to fruition, we’ll see.

So if you have any questions or comments, you know the drill. Drop by my blog Sally in the Zen.com. Click on the Contact page. Drop me your thoughts, your opinions, and depending on what it is, maybe I’ll feature it as an episode in the future. We’ll see.

I thank you so much for spending a few minutes of your time with me in my pursuit to find Zen moments in everyday living. Take care of yourself. Take care of your family, and I will talk to you soon.